United States

US: Kath & Kim given full season order

The reviews at home and abroad may have been mixed, but the US adaptation of popular Australian comedy Kath & Kim has been successful enough to be given a full season order. NBC has to date aired four episodes of the series, and the announcement means that the current order will be expanded from 13 […]

YouTube starts offering full-length CBS shows

YouTube has begun to show full-length episodes of shows from US network CBS Corporation’s archives in a bid to boost advertising revenue. Google, the site’s owner, says it is in negotiations with other networks to sign similar deals. Many local and overseas networks already offer short (up to 10-minute) clips of shows, including the BBC, […]

US: Senate hearing into digital TV switchover commences

The US Senate Commerce Committee began their hearing overnight into the the digital TV transition on February 17th next year with the committee chair seeing the potential for serious disruption for the next US Administration.
The next administration will inherit the transition 29 days into their first term and according to the Committee’s chair, Democratic Hawaiian […]

US: D-Day arrives in North Carolina

The US city of Wilmington, North Carolina, will become the first in the United States to switch off analogue TV at 12.00pm tomorrow (local time), Monday 8 September.
At that time, the local affiliates for ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC and Trinity Broadcasting, will switch off analogue transmission and broadcast signals will be available only via digital […]

US: Laurence Fishburne joins cast of CSI

CSI: Crime Scene Investigation has solved the mystery of who will replace departing CBS series star William Petersen: It’s Laurence Fishburne.
Fishburne, an Emmy and Tony winner, will be introduced in the ninth episode of the upcoming 10th season, the network told The Associated Press on Monday. He’ll play a forensics scientist with a secret.
Fishburne is […]

US: TV still major news source

A survey of Americans news habits has shown that Television remains a leading source of news in the country.   Results from the Pew Research Center’s biannual survey on news consumption habits have also shown that newspaper readership is dropping, while online readership is growing.
The survey has highlighted a growing group of people, refered to as […]

US: Online video viewing up, but TV remains #1

New research in the United States from Nielsen tells us what we already knew: internet use is on the up, and online and mobile video viewing has grown markedly over the course of the last twelve months.
But Nielsen’s new “three-screen” reports - aggregating data from television, internet and mobile usage - also reveals that television […]

Screen actors play down strike speculation

For months, there’s been speculation that the American television industry could once again be crippled by strike action, but that possibility has been played down by the actors’ union at the centre of the dispute.
The Screen Actors Guild (SAG) in the US has been in deadlocked negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television […]

US: Questions over digital switchover readiness

Come September 8th at noon, Wilmington in North Carolina will become the first US market to switch off analogue television.  The 135th biggest market in the US was chosen by the FCC earlier this year as a testbed for the nationwide switchoff that will occur on February 17 2009.
However, the Government Accountability Office have published […]